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Availability and Use of Pedestrian Infrastructure Data to Support Active Transportation Planning | The National Academies Press
by Zdan, Terry (MI) 24 Nov '20

24 Nov '20

https://www.nap.edu/catalog/25995/availability-and-use-of-pedestrian-infras… FYI Happy Trails Terry Zdan

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UK city launches ‘smart junctions’ that prioritize cyclists and pedestrians
by Beth McKechnie 23 Nov '20

23 Nov '20

Transport for Greater Manchester <https://tfgm.com/> (TfGM) has announced the rollout of 20 ‘smart junctions’ across the city. They use sensors to detect the type of road user at junctions and allow different modes of transport to be given priority. Developed in collaboration with AI firm Vivacity Labs <https://vivacitylabs.com/>, the scheme aims to accommodate and promote the use of active travel modes such as cycling and walking, which have become an increased priority for UK cities in light of the Covid-19 pandemic. The project first went live earlier this year, but is now being scaled up to cover 20 junctions in Manchester by the end of 2021. Speaking after its launch, the UK’s Digital Infrastructure Minister Matt Warman said: “Smart traffic technology is just one of the many ground-breaking areas the government is funding to pioneer new ways for artificial intelligence and 5G to transform our lives for the better. We’re backing this initiative in (Greater) Manchester to improve the city’s transport, reduce journey times, and cut pollution.” Full article: https://thenextweb.com/shift/2020/11/18/uk-city-launches-smart-junctions-th…

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Forget electric vehicles. Post-pandemic cities don't need them - they are still cars
by Charles Feaver 21 Nov '20

21 Nov '20

Eric Reguly opinion piece in the Globe and Mail: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/commentary/article-forget-electric- vehicles-post-pandemic-cities-dont-need-them-they/ . The hype around EVs and their offspring, self-driving e-cars, is dazzling and relentless, and anyone who thinks they should not be part of the new urban mix is treated as a Luddite. Some mayors are swayed by these arguments, especially the clean-air one. The few enlightened ones, such as Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo, are not. Ms. Hidalgo and her like see an EV for what it is - a car. Cars take up public space. They need to be parked. They are a menace to pedestrians and bikers. They require roads and taxpayer funds to build and maintain those roads. The ideal city is not filled with sleek, silent, non-polluting e-cars; it is a city devoid of cars. Yet the tech lobby, the Wall Street machine behind it and Elon Musk, boss of Tesla, the world's most successful EV company, would have you think that buying an e-car is the morally correct and patriotic consumer choice. . Local and regional governments who push EVs might not realize that doing so commits themselves to a spending program they cannot afford. Making cities EV friendly would require digging up streets to create a vast network of unsightly charging stations. In a 2019 report, the International Council on Clean Transportation estimated that installing a single direct-current, 150-kilowatt fast-charging station, with two chargers each site, would cost more than US$38,000 in labour, materials, permits and taxes (the greater the power level, the higher the cost). . A 2018 report by Wood Mackenzie determined that charging 60,000 EVs simultaneously in Texas (which has 24-million registered vehicles) could bring down the electrical grid, assuming they were plugged into 100-kilowatt fast chargers. To accommodate hundreds of thousands of EV, Texas would have to build new peak-demand generating plants, probably coal burners. Cost aside, that would be a rather pointless exercise, since EVs are supposed to make the air cleaner. . Cities are run by politicians and the smartest politicians stick with what they know and what they can control. They know and can control public transportation. Most big cities around the world have a century or more of experience in this field. They have zero experience in building and managing vast networks of charging stations and all the supporting infrastructure. Public transportation will make a comeback once the COVID-19 vaccines are rolled out. The best way to reclaim cities from cars is to invest in subways, buses, rail and bike paths. .

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How to get rid of parking minimums: Edmonton's experience
by Beth McKechnie 18 Nov '20

18 Nov '20

*If you missed yesterday's webinar on how Edmonton eliminated parking minimums, check out the recording and resources below. Highly recommended!* Thank you for joining the Strong Towns Team for "How to Get Rid of Parking Minimums." *You can watch (or re-watch) the webinar recording, or share it with others, here! <https://strongtowns.apms5.com/anywhere/m?s=strongtowns&m=s_8f218988-0cc5-42…>* Find tons of information about the process of eliminating parking minimums in Edmonton here. <https://strongtowns.apms5.com/anywhere/m?s=strongtowns&m=s_8f218988-0cc5-42…> And for Strong Towns coverage of Edmonton's success to read and share, check out "Will Edmonton Be the First Major Canadian City to Eliminate Parking Minimums?" <https://strongtowns.apms5.com/anywhere/m?s=strongtowns&m=s_8f218988-0cc5-42…> (Spoiler: It was!) and "Parking minimums are costing your city. For a way forward, look to Edmonton." <https://strongtowns.apms5.com/anywhere/m?s=strongtowns&m=s_8f218988-0cc5-42…> Thanks again for your hard work! —Lauren at Strong Towns

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UMCycle winter cycling workshop
by Beth McKechnie 18 Nov '20

18 Nov '20

Winter cycling workshop UMCycle is hosting an online winter cycling workshop on Nov. 20. The free workshop is aimed at both those with experience and those new to winter biking. It will cover what to wear, what to keep in mind, and how to get the most out of your bike mechanically. Registration is required on EventBrite by noon on Nov. 19, and the event will take place on Zoom at 2 p.m. For more, see www.eventbrite.ca/e/winter- cycling-workshop-tickets-127498249697

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Webinar — Make Biking Better in Your City
by Beth McKechnie 16 Nov '20

16 Nov '20

[image: The Advocacy Academy provides city leaders, local advocates and retailers with a better understanding of our PlacesForBikes City Rating program.] <https://u8232924.ct.sendgrid.net/ls/click?upn=-2FQ23vsRKP4fdjLiX7FqTpgjHEFB…> The Advocacy Academy provides city leaders, local advocates and retailers with a better understanding of our PlacesForBikes City Ratings program. Learn how to make local improvements that boost your score and discover the secrets of success from the world’s best bicycling cities. Join us on *November 17* at *2 pm MT* for a 30-minute presentation, followed by a 15-minute Q&A. <https://u8232924.ct.sendgrid.net/ls/click?upn=-2FQ23vsRKP4fdjLiX7FqTpgjHEFB…> Can't make the webinar? *Register now <https://u8232924.ct.sendgrid.net/ls/click?upn=-2FQ23vsRKP4fdjLiX7FqTpgjHEFB…>*, and we'll send you a recording later. <https://u8232924.ct.sendgrid.net/ls/click?upn=-2FQ23vsRKP4fdjLiX7FqTphxVtOE…> [image: Facebook] <https://u8232924.ct.sendgrid.net/ls/click?upn=-2FQ23vsRKP4fdjLiX7FqTpqJQESe…> [image: Twitter] <https://u8232924.ct.sendgrid.net/ls/click?upn=-2FQ23vsRKP4fdjLiX7FqTpkfMZIE…> [image: Instagram] <https://u8232924.ct.sendgrid.net/ls/click?upn=-2FQ23vsRKP4fdjLiX7FqTphuqGaA…> [image: YouTube] <https://u8232924.ct.sendgrid.net/ls/click?upn=-2FQ23vsRKP4fdjLiX7FqTpifo-2F…> How many people in your company know about our campaign to help new riders *Keep Riding* <https://u8232924.ct.sendgrid.net/ls/click?upn=-2FQ23vsRKP4fdjLiX7FqTprculua…> into 2021? © 2020 PeopleForBikes Coalition Business Network 501(c)6. All rights reserved.

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The 15 minute city
by Charles Feaver 14 Nov '20

14 Nov '20

Good article in the weekend Globe about European cities becoming bike-friendly In Europe, cycling caught on in a big way this year as COVID-19 discouraged cars and crowded public transit. Some cities' leaders hope to make the habit permanent and make congestion a thing of the past Biking went mainstream virtually overnight, and cities such as Paris and Milan pushed the notion of the 15-minute city, where all of lifes necessities are within a 15-minute reach by foot or bike. Pontevedra is a Galician city of about 83,000 on the Atlantic, just north of the Portuguese border. When Mr. Fernández Lores, now 66, was elected mayor in 1999, he inherited a pretty but ailing little metropolis. The historic centre was plugged with cars, and its narrow streets were filled with fumes and drug dealers. The street in front of his office saw 14,000 cars pass by a day. In a 2018 interview with The Guardian, he said he found the centre dead." Within a month, he and his team swung into action. The entire historic centre was made a car-free pedestrian area. Surface parking spots were eliminated, opening up almost 1,700 spots for public use, and underground ones were built on the periphery. In the outer zones, they replaced traffic lights with roundabouts to ease traffic flow and end the gunning of engines at green lights, and brought speed limits down to 30 kilometres an hour. Footpaths, bike lanes and green space were added. It wasnt supposed to work, but it did. He got some pushback from motorists, who thought they had the right to park two tonnes of metal and rubber next to medieval buildings, but only some. Years before the pandemic persuaded other mayors to follow a similar route, Pontevedra was lauded as an urban renewal model and has won several international awards, including the UN-Habitat award in 2014. Most children now walk to school alone, and the streets have become alive and filled with people, the UN said. The city claims zero traffic deaths since 2008, a 70-per-cent reduction in carbon dioxide emissions, 12,000 new inhabitants (no small achievement in a country whose towns are depopulating fast), a drop in crime and a 30-per-cent increase in business revenues. Ms Hidalgo, 61, is a member of Frances Socialist Party and was first elected Paris mayor in 2014. She came in with a vision a clever one. Instead of launching a war against cars and climate change per se, she went after air pollution, a quality-of-life issue that ensured broad buy-in. Who could be against breathable air? By 2016, she had introduced Paris Respire days that eliminated cars from most areas of the centre on the first Sunday of each month and made public transportation free on those days. Later, she turned the busy highway that runs along the north side of the River Seine into a riverside park. European cities, like Paris, were smart to focus on air pollution rather than climate change, says Mr. Toderian. Air pollution is real for people. You can see it, smell it. People liked what she did. Before the pandemic hit, Ms. Hidalgo ramped up her effort to reduce pollution, which meant getting Parisians out of cars and onto bikes and pedestrian walkways. She is creating 1,400 kilometres of bike lanes throughout Paris almost every street will have a lane and has removed thousands of surface parking spots. Her plan is to get rid of 60,000 of them, or about 70 per cent of the total. The major east-west artery, Rue de Rivoli, went car-free when Paris emerged from lockdown in May. From 2024, diesel cars will be banned More than a few European cities are emulating, or hope to emulate, the Paris model. One is Milan, Italys commercial capital, which is also discouraging car use by handing over streets to cyclists and pedestrians. The Lithuanian capital, Vilnius, where a former mayor once used an armoured military vehicle to crush a car parked in a bike lane, is doing the same. But it wont work everywhere. Athens botched its Great Walk project, conceived only last year, to turn car-clogged streets in the centre into gracious, tree-lined pedestrian boulevards. The project was poorly designed, executed and marketed to the public. Edinburgh, one of northern Europes best-preserved old cities, is struggling to add bike lines and pedestrian-only streets. Anthony Robson, an Edinburgh solicitor and bike-lane lobbyist, says Conservative factions and motorists are resisting the idea of adopting a strategy similar to Pariss. The Conservative councillors equated more cars with more shopping, he says. They said, No cars, no commerce.' Weve been trying to debunk this notion. https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/article-bikes-pedestrians-and-the-15- minute-city-how-the-pandemic-is/

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The bike path factor: active transport of growing importance for homebuyers
by Beth McKechnie 14 Nov '20

14 Nov '20

Zolo (national online real estate brokerage) report: Top Canadian cities for alternative transportation <https://www.zolo.ca/blog/best-centres-alternative-transportation> Spoiler alert: Winnipeg ranks 22nd * * * * *Calgary Herald: The bike path factor: active transport of growing importance for homebuyers Author of the article: Joel Schlesinger • for the Calgary Herald Publishing date: Nov 13, 2020 https://calgaryherald.com/life/homes/new-homes/the-bike-path-factor-active-… Living in communities with plenty of opportunity for active transport — bike trails, transit and walking paths — are viewed as increasingly desirable, a new study shows. Yet the report on the top Canadian cities for alternative transportation painted Calgary in a rather unfavourable light, ranking it near the bottom of the 100 urban centres surveyed. “We were examining how communities may be more desirable because they offer transport accessibility outside of using your car,” says Romana King, director of content with Zolo, a national online real estate brokerage, which published the study late last month. In this respect Calgary ranked 79th with a negative score for alternative transport. The score is compiled using a variety of metrics, such as elevation change, precipitation, along with the quality of bicycle and walking paths, and mass transit. Montreal and Ottawa ranked No. 1 and 2 in the study, with Edmonton in 36th place. King says Calgary’s ranking — while interesting — is not a damning indictment of its active transport opportunities. “Larger urban areas are always going to outshine smaller ones because they have larger public purses to build more infrastructure,” she says, adding Calgary has the fourth largest population among Canadian cities. Zolo included several other factors to balance large cities, which typically have rail transit and extensive bike lanes and paths, with smaller centres like Okotoks and Cochrane, which ranked 33rd and 34th respectively. The elevation change metric no doubt hampers Calgary’s score, she adds, given it is hilly making riding a bike to work more challenging, for example. King further notes the study examined alternative transport because of its growing importance to buyers. On that point, realtor Tim Jones agrees. “Being active is important to Calgarians in general,” says the broker/owner of Re/Max Prime in Calgary. “Proximity to bike paths, walking paths, parks and green space all have a positive effect on the value and saleability of homes in the Calgary region.” He further notes in the last few months, because of COVID-19, that properties located near pathways and parks are especially seeing higher demand from buyers. But being near public transportation is less of a concern among buyers. Jones says this demand trend could also be a result of the pandemic with more people working from home. “Both large and small organizations have been forced to have staff work from home this year, resulting in many cost saving benefits” for people, such as lower gasoline and parking costs. Consequently the focus for buyers is more on communities with active transport options that are recreational as opposed to those offering alternatives to commuting to work by car. Still, King suggests the study reflects that when people are looking for a home, considerations like proximity to these amenities can be just as important as what’s inside the home. “When people are looking for a home, quite often what they want is something that is going to satisfy their budget, but they also look for things like being close to a school, close to work or easy access to grocery stores,” King says. * * * * * Edmonton Journal: Alternative transport study ranks Edmonton ahead of most big Canadian cities [image: Joel Schlesinger, for the Edmonton Journal]Joel Schlesinger, for the Edmonton Journal Published on: November 13, 2020 https://www.norfolkandtillsonburgnews.com/life/homes/alternative-transport-… Edmonton ranks well among major Canadian cities for alternatives to the automobile for getting around, a recent study reveals. The capital city placed 36th among 100 municipalities in Canada, according to a new study by Zolo, a national online real estate brokerage. “It’s not just about the transit score,” says Romana King, Zolo’s director of content. “It’s also about the ability to bike and walk.” The survey ranked communities according to a number of metrics from walking and biking paths to transit access, and even other variables like elevation change and precipitation. King says the purpose behind measuring several factors was to balance out the advantage big cities have — with extensive transit systems — over smaller ones, which may feature better walkability but less robust public transportation. An Edmonton bedroom community, for example, “might not be the best for public transportation, but it likely ranks better for walkability,” she says. “So while you can’t walk from your home to downtown Edmonton in a lot of cases, you can get around with walking and biking in these smaller communities so that would allow them to rank higher in some respects.” The only community near Edmonton to appear in the study was Spruce Grove, ranked 38th. (Other surrounding communities such as St. Albert and Sherwood Park were not ranked.) Nationally, Montreal and Ottawa ranked first and second, while Calgary sat in 79th place. The highest ranking Alberta city was Fort McMurray at 32nd place. For Edmonton realtor Kathy Schmidt, active transport amenities are becoming more and more important to buyers. “Every buyer has individual priorities … whether it’s being close to the airport for frequent business travel, close to their work especially if they’re someone who may be on-call, or close to family for help with child care or caring for aging parents,” says the broker/owner of Schmidt Realty Group Inc. Increasingly, many buyers are seeking to live closer to downtown, which has more options for transit as well as access to the river valley trail network, she adds. Additionally, homes with good access to alternative transport and amenities tend to appreciate better than average in the city. Schmidt cites neighbourhoods like Ritchie, adjacent to Mill Creek and close to Whyte Avenue, along with Greenfield and Sweet Grass, both a little farther south. All have good access to transit and paths for walking and biking to shops and restaurants — though Ritchie offers more in that respect, as well as being closer to downtown. “Looking back 10 years, you can see that single-family homes in these neighbourhoods have held their value or increased in value over time,” she says. The average single-family detached home in Edmonton increased by 10.5 per cent in value while the average home in Ritchie grew by 20.7 per cent. A home in Sweet Grass slightly also outpaced the city average with a gain of 12.8 per cent. Yet Schmidt further notes LRT and bike paths — particularly those on major thoroughfares — can be “controversial.” While homeowners appreciate these amenities, many prefer to be 10 minutes’ walk from an LRT station as opposed to adjacent to these amenities. With respect to bicycle options, some buyers driving to work find their commute negatively affected by lanes on key arteries, she notes. Still, King and Schmidt argue alternative transport is increasingly a positive for home values. “It’s more than likely homes offering better active transport accessibility hold value better in downturns and accelerate better in upswings,” King says.

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School Streets Feedback - community survey
by Denae Penner 12 Nov '20

12 Nov '20

Hello all, We've launched an online survey to get feedback and input on the school streets pilot project <https://greenactioncentre.ca/at-school/school-streets-pilot/>. *Please share what you think about School Streets for Winnipeg to help us figure out next steps. Do we keep it? * Fill out the survey >> <https://ca.surveygizmo.com/s3/50087587/School-Street> Survey closes Monday, November 16 at midnight. The survey is for Isaac Brock students & parents, as well as Winnipegers more broadly. We're looking for input from others, including parents of students at other schools, interested citizens, business owners, etc. Thanks, *Denae Penner *(she/her/hers) Sustainable Transportation Program Coordinator, Green Action Centre <http://www.greenactioncentre.ca/> 204-925-3777 ext. 114 | 3rd floor, 303 Portage Ave., Winnipeg, MB *Green Action Centre is your green living hub* Support our work by becoming a member <http://greenactioncentre.ca/support/become-a-member/>. Donate at CanadaHelps.org <http://canadahelps.org/>. Facebook <https://www.facebook.com/GreenActionCentre/> | Twitter <https://twitter.com/greenactionctr> | Instagram <https://www.instagram.com/greenactioncentre/> | LinkedIn <https://www.linkedin.com/company/green-action-centre/>

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Open Streets full report
by Beth McKechnie 12 Nov '20

12 Nov '20

Hi everyone, If you want to check out the full Open Streets report presented to the Standing Policy Committee on Infrastructure Renewal and Public Works, see attached. Or you can find it online (Report #6): http://clkapps.winnipeg.ca/dmis/ViewDoc.asp?DocId=20520&SectionId=&InitUrl= cheers, Beth -- Beth McKechnie (she/her) *| *Green Action Centre <http://www.greenactioncentre.ca/> 3rd floor, 303 Portage Ave | (204) 925-3777 x102 | Find us here <http://greenactioncentre.ca/content/ecocentre-directions-and-travel-options/> *Green Action Centre is located in Winnipeg on Treaty No. 1 territory and the traditional homeland of the Métis Nation. * *The water we drink comes from Shoal Lake 40 First Nation on Treaty Three territory.* Green Action Centre is your green living hub Support our work by becoming a member <http://greenactioncentre.ca/support/become-a-member/>. Donate at CanadaHelps.org <http://canadahelps.org/> <http://www.gomanitoba.ca>

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